The legondary Cock Ale

cyberwollf · Nov 4, 2011

EDIT: spellcheck fails me on the title of the thread and you cant edit it. FWIW: Legendary*

Everyone has seen or heard of the recipe quoted in Papazians book:

classification: cock ale, historical, 1500s, chicken, meat Source: Chris Sutherland ([email protected]), 6/20/93
The recipe for authentic Cock Ale has finally arrived. Boy it sure is scary: COCK ALE (circa the 1500's) A real recipe from some obscure text found in the Scottish Highlands... Enjoy....
Procedure:

"Take 10 gallons of ale and a large cock, the older the better; parboil the cock, flay him, and stamp him in a stone mortar until his bones are broken (you must gut him when you flaw him). Then, put the cock into two quarts of sack, and put to it five pounds of raisins of the sun - stoned; some blades of mace, and a few cloves. Put all these into a canvas bag, and a little before you find the ale has been working, put the bag and ale together in vessel. In a week or nine days bottle it up, fill the bottle just above the neck and give it the same time to ripen as other ale."
Alternate recipe:

Brutal, eh? I was also given a modern recipe written by some guy named C.J.J. Berry.... Here goes this one... "Take a few pieces of _cooked_ chicken and a few chicken bones (approx one tenth of the edible portion of the bird) well crushed or minced.
Also take half of pound of raisins, a very little mace, and one or maybe two cloves. Add all these ingrediants to half a bottle of string country white wine. Soak for 24 hrs. Then make on gallon of beer as follows:
1 lb Malt extract
1 Oz Hops
1/2 lb demerarra sugar
1 gallon water
Yeast and nutrient

Add the whole of the chicken mixture to the beer at the end of the second day. Fermentation will last six or seven days longer than usual and the ale should be matured at least one month in the bottle. This cock ale is of the barley wine type.

Our homebrew club has a monthly brewout in the warmer months. Since I am moving out of the state this seemed like a fine recipe for my last brewout. Everyone talks about the chicken beer but i have never seen anyone make it.

I started with the extract recipe listed above.

Being that it was 9am Kroger didnt have any rotisserie chickens out yet so I grabbed KFC grilled chicken. Stripped off the skin and fat and it and spices to the wine while the wort boiled

2 days later I added the chicken chunks and all to the primary and let it go for a few weeks. I bottled it last night and it pretty much tastes like what you expect. Crappy extract beer mixed with cheap white wine with chicken mixed in. The 2 cloves and mace REALLY overpower it. I plan to let the bottles sit and open them at the homebrew clubs Christmas party. Probably throw one in the bottle exchange too

Now you can say you have seen Cock Ale attempted (wouldn't make it again)

Northjerzyg · Nov 4, 2011

Thanx for helping me dodge a bullet. That was next on my to brew list.......

Clann · Nov 4, 2011

Well, you had the stones to brew it. Keep us um.....informed

bottlebomber · Nov 4, 2011

Note to self: don't brewswap with cyberwollf...

flyfisherwes · Nov 4, 2011

Totally thought this was going another direction.

cyberwollf · Nov 4, 2011

flyfisherwes said:
Totally thought this was going another direction.

It was a pretty epic brew day. Lots of innuendos.

"stop playing with your cock...ale"

"Are you going to dry cock it"

"If its infected it will be dirty cock....ale"

"Can I open the lid and look at your cock... ale"

Also thought about upping the ABV and adding 0.25lbs of chocolate malt to make it..... you can guess on that one

Revvy · Nov 4, 2011

You're now my brewing hero!!!

cyberwollf · Nov 4, 2011

Just a man with a huge [bottle of] cock [ale]

Jebu1788 · Nov 4, 2011

My thoughts on reading the title:

"Oh no. Ohhhh noooo.... he didn't... he couldn't have, could he?? Oh man, he did!"

Wow. You are a braver man than I. Long live the Colonel!

GuldTuborg · Nov 5, 2011

Wow.

My hat's off to you, as it takes some stones to try something like this. Oh, and I saw that the recipe called for a "large cock". Thanks for not trying to take mine.

cyberwollf · Nov 5, 2011

GuldTuborg said:
Wow.

My hat's off to you, as it takes some stones to try something like this. Oh, and I saw that the recipe called for a "large cock". Thanks for not trying to take mine.

You raise chickens?

GuldTuborg · Nov 5, 2011

Of course I do. I wasn't being ambiguous on any point, was I?

goforevercrazywithit · Nov 28, 2012

I'm going to make this when I go back home in December. I'll let you guys know how it goes.

Xpertskir · Nov 29, 2012

somehow the fact that you used KFC makes this even better. You should write them a letter letting them know what you did with their grilled chicken...lol

Well done.

RainyDays · Nov 29, 2012

Wynkoop in Denver did a beer with balls to match your cock! (rocky mountain oyster stout)

fizgig · Apr 11, 2013

so how did this age? what's the point of the chicken in this from a historical perspective (i.e. why did they dry hop with a chicken?).

also, fair warning

daksin · Apr 11, 2013

fizgig said:
so how did this age? what's the point of the chicken in this from a historical perspective (i.e. why did they dry hop with a chicken?).

Obviously it was because they wanted a big cock aroma, but without making the beer taste like cock.

tcw5028 · Jun 15, 2013

I brewed something like this but I used duck and turkey along with the chicken. I'm calling it "Turdrunken" haha. It actually is not to bad, it's not great but it did exceed my very low expectations.

The legondary Cock Ale

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